I gave my readers a bit of the “Pandora Lament,” which Sir Richard Steele thought one of the most perfect of all pastoral compositions. And the little whimsey about Amoret, everybody knows; certainly it is best known of all he did: “Coquet and coy at once her air, Both studied, tho’ both seemed neglected; Careless she is with artful care, Affecting to seem unaffected. With skill her eyes dart every glance, Yet change so soon, you’d ne’er suspect ’em, For she’d persuade they wound by chance, Tho’ certain aim and art direct them.” They are very pretty; yet are you not sure that our wheezing, phlegmatic, business-loving, Dutch King William would have sniffed contemptuously at the reading of any such verselets? _A Pamphleteer._ A writer, however, of that time, of about the same age with Congreve, whom King William did favor, and did take at one period into his confidence,--and one of whose books, at least, you all have liked at some epoch of your life, and thought quite wonderful and charming--I must tell you more about. His presence counted for nothing; he was short, wiry, hook-nosed--not anyway elegant; Mr. Congreve would have scorned association with him. He was the son of a small butcher in London, and had never much schooling; but he was quick of apprehension, always eager to inform himself; bustling, shrewd, inquisitive, with abundance of what we call “cheek.” He never lacked simple, strong language to tell just what he thought, or what he knew; and he never lacked the courage to put his language into print or into speech, as the case might be. By dint of his dogged perseverance and much natural aptitude he came to know Latin and Spanish and Italian, and could speak French, such as it was, very fluently. He was well up in geography and history, and such science as went into the books of those days. He wrote sharp, stinging pamphlets about whatever struck him as wrong, or as wanting a good slap, whether in morals, manners, or politics. He was in trade, which took him sometimes into France, Spain, or Flanders. He could tell everyone how to make money and how to conduct business better than he could do either himself. He had his bankruptcies, his hidings, his compoundings with creditors, and his times in prison; but he came out of all these experiences with just as much animation and pluck and assurance as he carried into them. There was a time when he was advertised as a fugitive, and a reward offered for his apprehension--all due to his sharp pamphlet-writing; and he was apprehended and had his fines to pay, and stood in the pillory; but the street-folk, with a love for his pluck and for his trenchant, homely, outspokenness, garnished the pillory with flowers and garlands. It was this power of incisive speech, and his capacity to win audience of the street-people, that made King William value his gifts and put them to service.